


a Thousand Years

by helo572



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Dancing, Drabble, F/M, Gency Week, Married Couple, Old Age, Old Married Couple, Older Characters, References to Illness, Slow Dancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-21 23:08:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11367546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helo572/pseuds/helo572
Summary: time stands stillbeauty in all she is.better known as, Genji and Mercy's last dance.





	a Thousand Years

**Author's Note:**

> for Gency Week 2.0's day 1 prompt: couple. [Join in on the Gency Week blog](https://officialgencyweek.tumblr.com/)! 
> 
> [**a thousand years** \- christina perri](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtOvBOTyX00)  
>  I always come out writing wordy angst, but I'm glad I'm writing all the same.

It’s on the rug in the lounge room, in the space between their old-fashioned place and the stolen sofa from the common room all those years ago. Angela’s toes squish into the worn old thing, squealing as Genji twirls her beneath his arm. Cyborg joints still whir that comforting noise as she rights, the two of them coming together, hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder, eye to eye.

 

_ As beautiful as the day I married you _ , she knows Genji will say. It twinkles on his pupils. It is written on his face in the lines and dimples which marr aged skin. It is etched into the walls of the old house, in timeless photographs, newspaper clippings, a fresh bouquet of flowers on the mantle.

 

One step closer. He whispers it across the warmth of the night air, touched by the fire which burns low at their feet. They have been dancing all night, it feels like, until the night was washed away.

 

Their last night.

 

_ All the best xo _ reads the card from the flowers, penned by bubbly eyes, a brown wave of hair, a boisterous English accent. She is still the same as the day Angela met her, untouched by time, by the woes of old age. Perhaps it is sadder, watching it all fall to dust around you, rather than crumbling around yourself in slow motion.

 

Genji still looks sad, even as he kisses her.

 

“It’s okay,” she hushes, gently against his lips. “It’s okay, Genji. I’m okay.”

 

His hand tightens against her waist. “I trust you to be.” His head dips down to her shoulder, chin resting against the soft grey curls cascading from behind her ear. “I know you aren’t scared.”

 

Angela sets them swaying again, a rekindling of the music between them, the tune which leads her into the dark. Genji does not move from her shoulder. They have known for eons, it has felt like, a slow breakdown of the air she breathes turning to ash.

 

Jack used to say it was because she spoke so much. Such a good doctor, fighting for her patients. Genji has been her best, still in her arms, as gorgeous as the day she married him. The world -- her world -- would not be the same without him.

 

Their last dance, tonight.

 

The oxygen tank had not gotten in the way, nor the  nasogastric tube which clings to her face. She knows it is the part Genji does not like, disturbing his fingers as he wipes away her hair, to feel her face over and over again. In the dark, the light, when they are alone, when they have company. She knows all he is trying to do is remember.

 

So is she, as they sway here together.

 

“I am glad we can be back here,” he goes on. Angela lets her eyes fall closed, lets herself time her breaths to the soft shuffle of their feet over the rug. He knows the picture Genji will paint, knows what creative beauty lives beneath the metal fingers of this wonderful man. “To return here again, first after the war, then again. And the family we raised here. The solitude we had. After all these years, I am certain I would not trade it. Not for a thousand years.” She huffs a laugh. Genji sets a new pace, his hands rediscovering her hip and shoulder. She entertains him, brown eyes meeting brown eyes, smile soft. “And a thousand more.”

 

The house is telling enough: surrounding them with the group photos of the original Overwatch, the Overwatch Recall, the old medbay, the little snaps of the crew in the commons, photo ops from downtime, from missions, from their little slices of life. And cards, drawings, from sons and daughters of their family. A Shimada signature on the drawing currently on the fridge, shaky Kanji, and a scribble of an Lindholm great-grandson. The stories around them: _Overwatch_ _saves the day_ , _Overwatch to the rescue_ , _Heroes for a new age_ , _The people we deserve_. The world will not forget, she knows this much. Neither will Genji, or her family, or her little old house she has been so blessed to grow old in. Angela’s deepening, telling smile is also to blame, so full of love she feels Genji’s knees weaken as he twirls her again, slowly.

 

“You old poet,” she excuses, returning to see the suggestion of tears swelling in those old, tired eyes. “Of course I know you wouldn’t. And neither would I.”

 

“I love you,” gushes from his mouth next, all at once, from wet lips and wet eyes and that same brand of closeness Genji has been clinging to all night. “I love you so much, Angela. A thousand years for you, a thousand more, and a thousand more.” Their hands are enclosed around each other, so here he presses a delicate kiss, never leaving her encaptured gaze. “Always. For you.”

 

Of course, she believes him. It has always been him, after all. And so fitting it is, that they dance last, that he holds her in his arms last, that she sees him last.

 

One step closer, and then back, as the song comes to a close on its finishing note. Their last dance, out it rings, off into the dark.

**Author's Note:**

> written vaguely, but Angela has COPD, a deliberating lifelong lung disease which makes it difficult to breathe.
> 
> thanks for reading! x


End file.
